"Look! Take it. See what a wonderful thing it is!"
She took the branch, trembling, and her eyes were bright with tears.
"And you knew it was blooming!" said Stelio.
He perceived the glittering silvery drops in her eyes, which made them look like the petals of a flower. And at that instant, of all her adored person, he loved most blindly the delicate lines that went from the corners of her eyes to her temples, the tiny veins that made her eyelids look like violets, the sweet curve of her cheek, the tapering chin, and all that never would bloom again, all the shadows of that impassioned face.
"Ah, Father," said she, with a bright glance, repressing her sadness, "will not Christ's Poor Man weep again in heaven for this broken branch?"
The friar smiled with playful indulgence.
"When this good gentleman saw our tree," he replied, "he gave me no time to speak, but had the branch in his hand in a moment, and I could only say Amen. But the almond tree is rich."
He was placid and affable, with a crown of hair still nearly black, with a refined, olive-skinned face, and great tawny eyes, as clear as a topaz.
"Here is some savory thyme," he added, offering the herbs to La Foscarina.
They could hear a choir of youthful voices singing a Response.
"Those are our novices; we have fifteen with us."
He accompanied the visitors to the meadow behind the convent. Standing on a bank, at the foot of a blasted cypress, the good monk pointed to the fertile isles, praised their abundance, mentioned their varieties of fruit, lauded the more delightful according to the seasons, and directed their attention toward the boats sailing toward the Rialto with their new harvest.
"Praise to Thee, O Lord, for our Mother Earth!" said the woman with the flowering branch.
The Franciscan was susceptible to the beauty of that feminine voice, and was silent.
Lofty cypresses encircled the pious field; four of them showed the marks of lightning strokes. Their tops were motionless, and were the only sharp outlines in the level of the meadows, and waters that blended with the horizon. Not the slightest breeze now stirred the infinite mirror. A profound enchantment like an ecstasy filled the lovely place with rapture. The melody of the winged creatures still continued to float from invisible regions, but it, too, seemed to begin to flag and soften in this silent sanctuary.